Durban film-maker Michael Cross’ award-winning documentary, The Fun’s Not Over - The James Phillips Story, will have its local premiere at the Durban International Film Festival.
The film, which recently won the Audience Award at this year’s Encounters South African International Documentary Film Festival, tells of the life of composer, musician, band leader James Phillips, who died aged 36 in July 1995.
Phillips’ Afrikaans alter ego Bernoldus Niemand’s 1983 single Hou My Vas Korporaal became an anthem of the anti-apartheid End Conscription Campaign.
He was the voice and conscience of a generation of white South Africans. In 1985, with the Cherry Faced Lurchers, he recorded the gut-wrenching Shot Down, which addressed white privilege and the violence of the apartheid state.
Phillips’ legacy is that of one of this country’s most aware, articulate and passionate artists. He was a satirist, a poet and probably one of the most accomplished songwriters South Africa has produced.
The Fun’s Not Over tells his story in his own words and through the voices of journalists like Max du Preez, satirists Zapiro and Pieter Dirk Uys, his musical collaborators like Koos Kombuis and Vusi Mahlasela, contemporary artists like Jack Parow and his friends and family.
The movie will be screened on July 21 at 8pm and July 25 at 6pm.
Screenings are at Musgrave.